Accursed: Padawanabee's Guide
=Skill Use and Synergies= Who do I cast Fire Shield on? Preferably, heroes. Fire Shield is usually wasted on creeps unless you just want to bug whoever they laned against you. Cast it on yourself, cast it on dieing allies, cast it on an ally who's about to run in. The thing about Fire Shield is in most situations it acts as a damage deterrent, to a degree. No one's gonna stop nuking pyromancer at 100 hp just because he has a 200 shield on him. But if everyone's level 5 and Magebane runs in with a level 2 Fire Shield on him, hitting the guy is just not worth it. In addition, Fire Shield works as a debuff. For those not used to the term, this means hostile effects such as damage over time, slows, and some harder disables are removed. If your ally is held by pollywog's net or electrician's grip and you cast Fire Shield on them, they're freed from the immobilize. When do I use Cauterize? Whenever you have health to spare. If your ult just activated or you have Fire Shield on yourself, cast it on ANYONE. Apart from the health requirement, it's extremely mana efficient for what it does. However, remember your role, supporter guy. If an allied 100 hp Blood hunter is chasing an enemy 100 hp pyromancer with no mana, heal the Blood Hunter. He needs the money more than you do, and the 250 isn't mitigated by magic armor if it's a heal. When do I use Flame Consumption? Preferably, as late as possible. It activates on it's own if you're under 400, so in most cases actually activating it will be a mistake. As long as your ult isn't on cooldown NO ONE wants to focus you over the Moon Queen at half life. If you activate your ult early, you're just as fragile as the rest of the team. Generally, let the ultimate go off on it's own, unless a legionaire is fighting you. His ult counters yours. There are some rare moments you'll want to activate your ult. If you see Magmus channeling his ultimate and noone's gonna stun him, throw your ult on, charge him, and enjoy the full heal. To summarize, let the ult take care of itself unless you see a HUGE amount of preferably AoE damage coming your way, in which case enjoy the 3/4/5 seconds of healing. Keep in mind that when your ult activates a rather noticeable visual effect (blue flames) appears on your hero. Any smart enemies will stop attacking you at this point, so don't rely on it's healing powers in some scenarios. Synergies 64px + 64px - High mana cost, but any damage Cauterize would deal to you is instead dealt to the flame shield if the shield was cast on yourself, possibly for even more damage dealt. You are a surprisingly powerful nuker early game if you use this combo right. 64px + 64px - Cooldown inefficient, but if you're in a position where you NEED a cauterize and you NEED health more than your minute long cooldown, any cauterize cast while your ult is on will heal you for 125. On the other hand, if you're down to 350 hp and your ult actives on it's own, go ahead and throw out a cauterize if it's not on cd. Those are the only real synergies, Flame Shield and your ult don't do much together, and Sear works slightly outside of the skillset. Keep in mind that a good accursed works beyond his nukes, if you build right (levels in Sear and hopefully build Mock of Brilliance) you hit HARD and FAST, and can provide MUCH more than HEALS to a team. Which is good, because 200 is a number that scales poorly into the late game where everyone has 2k hp. As with everything in this guide, what I suggest here is pretty standard for Accursed/Abaddon at all levels of play. =Items=